Distraction - Bruce Sterling [159]
For a federal science facility, this was a disaster of epic magnitude, but for proles, it was business as usual.
So—as Oscar explained to the Emergency Committee—it was a question of symbiosis. And symbiosis was doable. Having boldly cut its ties to the conventional rules of political reality, the Collaboratory’s new hybrid population could float indefinitely within their glass bubble. They had no money, but they had warmth, power, air, food, shelter; they could all mind the business of living. They could wait out the turbulence beyond their borders, and since they were also ignoring federal oversight, they could all concentrate on their favorite pet projects. They could get some genuine scientific work accomplished, for once. This was a formidable achievement, a Shangri-la almost, and it was there within their grasp. All they had to do was come to terms with their own contradictions.
There was a long silence after Oscar’s presentation. The Emergency Committee gazed at him in utter wonderment. At the moment, the Committee’s quorum consisted of Greta, her chief confidant and backer Albert Gazzaniga, Oscar himself, Yosh Pelicanos, Captain Burningboy, and a representative Moderator thug—a kid named Ombahway Tuddy Flagboy.
“Oscar, you’re amazing,” Greta said. “You have such talent for making impossible things sound plausible.”
“What’s so impossible about it?”
“Everything. This is a federal facility! These Moderator people invaded it by force. They’re occupying it. They are here illegally. We can’t aid and abet that! Once the President sends in troops, we’ll all be outed for collaboration. We’ll be arrested. We’ll be fired. No, it’s worse than that. We’ll be purged.”
“That never happened in Louisiana,” Oscar said. “Why should it happen here?”
Gazzaniga spoke up. “That’s because Congress and the Emergency committees never really wanted that air base in Louisiana in the first place. They never cared enough about it to take action.”
“They don’t care about you, either,” Oscar assured him. “It’s true that the President expressed an interest, but hey, it’s been a long week now. A week is forever during a military crisis. There aren’t any federal troops here. Because there isn’t any military crisis here. The President’s military crisis is in Holland, not East Texas. He’s not going to deploy troops domestically when the Dutch Cold War is heating up. If we had better sense, we’d realize that the Moderators are our troops. They’re better than federal troops. Real troops can’t feed us.”
“We can’t afford thousands of nonpaying guests,” Pelicanos said.
“Yosh, just forget the red ink for a minute. We don’t have to ‘afford them.’ They are affording us. They can feed and clothe us, and all we have to do is share our shelter and give them a political cover. That’s the real beauty of this Emergency, you see? We can go on here indefinitely! This is the apotheosis of the Strike. During the Strike, we were all refusing to do anything except work on science. Now that we have an Emergency, the scientists can continue their science, while the Moderators will assume the role of a supportive, sympathetic, civil population. We’ll just ignore everyone else! Everything that annoyed us in the past simply falls off our radar. All those senseless commercial demands, and governmental oversight, and the crooked contractors … they’re all just gone. They no longer have any relevance.”
“But nomads don’t understand science,” Gazzaniga said. “Why would they support scientists, when they could just loot the place and leave?”
“Hey,” said Burningboy. “I can understand science, fella! Wernher von Braun! Perfect example. Dr. von Braun lucked into a big ugly swarm of the surplus flesh, just like you have! They’re heading for Dachau anyway if he don’t use ’em, so he might as well grind some use out of ’em, assembling his V-2 engines.”
“What the hell is he talking about?” Gazzaniga demanded. “Why does he always talk like that?”
“That